The Life of the Party: Festive Vision in Modern Fiction

By Christopher Ames

Book Overview

Critics have long recognised the links between community festivals and literary art. The comedies and tragedies of the ancient Greeks grew out of their festivals. Anglo-Saxon poetry was often read at festive occasions. And, as such critics as Northrop Frye and C L Barber have shown, the structural patterns of Renaissance drama are inseparable from their festive origins. In The Life of the Party. Christopher Ames argues that the private party has become the festival of modern culture and has served as a shaping force in the fiction of many important 20th-century writers.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0820312908
• ISBN13: 9780820312903
• Release Date: January 1991
• Publisher: Univ of Georgia Pr
• Length: 360 Pages
• Weight: 1.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.8" x 1.3" x 6.1"